And Blood Leads to Doom
This cover's pretty simple, not too engrossing. But it's the only bit of Ian Churchill's art we get to see this issue, because Daniel Sampere and Stefano Martino fill in pencils for this issue. There's no story justification, and I can't figure out another major reason because there's not a whole lot of little complicated things drawn here. A lot of this issue is massive panels with simple images. It's the easiest issue to be lazy with. On the art side at least, the words in this issue are ridiculous.
There's just so damn much dialogue and internal monologuing in this issue. Page after page is just cluttered with words and words, it's insane. Most of it's necessary, though there's definitely some awkward dialogue lines thrown in there. The sisters of fate, or whatever those servants of Brother Blood are called, tend to give out exposition in a very clunky manner, and Brother Blood himself has a portrayal that swings wildly from 'teenager himself' to 'textbook exposition,' to 'sophisticated cult leader.' I can't really tell what his personality is supposed to be like because it's so inconsistent.
There's a really awkward sacrifice in this issue that swoops in out of nowhere, but it's pretty obvious that this isn't a permanent one. It was just a demonstration of what Fairchild was JUST THEN thinking, that her team has little regard for the lives of others AND themselves. This could be cool, but as a whole they all prortray this archetype very generically, and when fighting in a group their personalities bleed together into an amorphous blob.
In Conclusion: 3/5
Big bland fight scenes that actually crowd large panels instead of using empty space, an excess of dialogue and exposition, and some cliche use of the character's m.o. make for a pretty weak issue, especially compared to the others. There's a surprise appearance at the end of a character I absolutely love, but have concerns over the new portrayal of. It's a so-so issue, but nothing too spectacular. It's not a great sign for the future of this series.
